Libeskind wins competition to design Canadian National Holocaust Monument

The plan came out ahead of David Adjaye and four others in the competition.

May 13, 2014 |

BD+C Staff

A design team featuring Daniel Libeskind and Gail Dexter-Lord has won a competition with its design for the Canadian National Holocaust Monument in Toronto.

The winning design, called "Landscape of Loss, Memory and Survival," is based on the Star of David. It beat out five competing submissions from the likes of David Adjaye, Julian Bonder, and Gilles Saucier.

"We are deeply honoured to be entrusted with designing the monument to Holocaust victims and survivors, and we are committed to creating a place of meaning and value for all Canadians in our country's capital," said Gail Dexter-Lord, Dezeen reports.

The monument is set to open in the autumn of 2015. Check out the original entry below.

Team Lord

Team Members

Gail Lord (museum planner)

Daniel Libeskind (architect)

Edward Burtynsky (artist)

Claude Cormier (landscape architect)

Dr. Doris Berger (Holocaust scholar)

Essay

The star that the Nazis forced millions of Jews to wear throughout Europe, in ghettos and in camps, to exclude them from humanity and to mark them for extermination, remains the visual symbol of the Holocaust. The Nazis and their collaborators also?used the triangles that comprise the star to label homosexuals, Roma, Sinti, Jehovah’s Witnesses and political and religious prisoners for murder. People with disabilities were the first targets of mass killing. When the Monument is seen from the green roof of the War Museum, the symbol of the star becomes clear.

“The Journey Through the Star” as designed by architect Daniel Libeskind is organized with two physical ground planes: the ascending landscape that points to the future and the descending plane into the Memorial.

People enter the Monument from Booth Street and descend between two tilted geometric structures: one polished concrete; the other a mesh screen that references incarceration behind fences of often electrified barbed wire through which a landscape is still visible.

At the bottom of the descending landscape we arrive at the “Gathering Place” which can accommodate up to 1,000 people for events such as National Holocaust Remembrance Day (in April), International Holocaust Remembrance Day (in January) and Human Rights Day (in December).

The space is traversed by a railway track embedded in the ground reminding us of the trains that transported people to their death. Surrounding the Gathering Space are tilted geometric concrete and mesh structures that create six triangular thematic spaces for contemplation and reflection.